Statistics NZ have been publishing yearbooks since 1893 which they say provide “a comprehensive statistical picture of life in New Zealand”. If you’re prepared to but a bit of effort in going through them you can some superb historical data so they are a really valuable resource – although going through them is made much easier by them having been digitised and therefore allowing people to use the browser search function.
So I was collating some information from them when I came across this piece of commentary in one of them. See if you can guess what year it is from (some of the dates in the piece should help to narrow it down)
Infernal Combustion Engines
Cars are one of the biggest threats to the global environment. They contribute to global warming, oil spills and water pollution, road congestion in cities, and noise and air pollution. The transport sector is estimated to be responsible for 40 percent of New Zealand’s greenhouse gas emissions. In the developed world cars account for an estimated 20 percent of the world’s total energy consumption. When the energy to build and maintain cars and roads is taken into account this figure could be as high as 50 percent.
Cars are particularly inefficient vehicles. In New Zealand the average car currently manages a mileage of 100 kilometres per 10 litres. To reach the Government’s target of a 20 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by the year 2000, this would have to be cut to 100 kilometres per 3.5 litres. Cars are also inefficient users of road space, carrying an average of only 1.2 passengers. A bus, using about twice the amount of road space, can carry up to 50 passengers.
New Zealand has the second highest rate of cars per capita in the world, with petrol consumption increasing by 4 percent a year. Car-related taxation, such as registration fees, import duty and road taxes, are low by international standards. Deregulation of the transport industry has meant the scrapping of some commuter services, with many others at risk; while, for a number of years, trucks have been gradually replacing trains and coastal shipping in the freight transport sector.
There are many suggestions on how to reduce New Zealanders’ reliance on cars. In Holland new taxes will add 50 percent to the cost of owning and running a car and extra taxes are being developed for heavy users.
Between 1989 and 1990 in Paris, 100000 parking spaces were eliminated to discourage commuters from driving into the city. A light rail system has been installed in Sydney to shuttle people around the city quickly, cheaply and cleanly. Other suggestions include more pedestrian only malls, wider footpaths to lessen road space and improvements to existing public transport systems to make them more attractive to commuters.
New Zealand’s high car use is an important issue that needs to be addressed. If New Zealand is to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions 20 percent by 2000, action must be taken soon. The longer the problem is ignored, the more drastic the measures will have to be.
The piece was from 1992 yearbook but what I found remarkable was how similar it is to many of the things we are saying now including:
- That cars are a big issue for the global environment including air, water and noise pollution.
- That they seriously contribute to congestion which is in large part due to being an inefficient use of space.
- That we have an over-reliance on them leading us to us having one of the highest car ownership rates in the world.
- That improved improvements to public transport, the pedestrian environment and levels of parking can make alternatives to driving more attractive.
So it’s also interesting to see what has happened to car ownership since that time, again thanks to the yearbook data. In 1992 there were ~1.5 million cars in New Zealand while in 2012 that number was ~2.3 million, an increase of ~800,000 cars. There has also been an increase in the number of vehicles per capita with it having increased from 0.43 to 0.52 over the same time period – although that is down slightly on the peak of 0.54 seen in 2007. Note this is just the number of private cars and so doesn’t include the likes of rental cars, motorcycles etc. Also the break in the data is from 1987 when there was a change in the way vehicle registrations were counted.
But even more interesting is that it isn’t just that we have more cars than we did in 1992, but the cars we buy now generally have larger engines with the percentage of them having a cc rating of more than 2000 increasing from 19 to 34% but peaking at 44% in 2004. This is of course in line with the Jeavons Paradox that as we improve the efficiency with how we use a resource that we increase the overall use of it. In this case as we make vehicles more efficient we buy bigger vehicles and drive more. The big spike around 1990 was the result of making it easier to bring in second hand cars
I guess that means we haven’t done a great job at combating those infernal combustion engines.
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I noticed that in London the unintended consequences of trying to get more mpg out of engines by going to small engine diesels has backfired in a big way over the last 15 years and both particulate pollution and consequently lung cancer rates are up.
Should we discourage small engine diesels in NZ to prevent it happening here?
You can tell it’s dated, because it has a New Zealander taking climate change seriously.
Hey, we live in a sunny corner of the world, where sea level rise isn’t a problem, so all the current government folks can think of in terms of global warming is that it might give them a bit more of the year to sit next to the pool.
In short, they see it as a non-issue. Out of sight, out of mind, grow some (artificially watered) oranges in Canterbury, where’s the problem? All good, continue as you go. Tragedy of the commons combined with inertia.
Guffaw! Yep, right on the money!
There are penty of NZers who take climate change seriously, but you are right, this is dated because it shows part of the
New Zealand **Government** taking climate change seriously for once.
I’d love to see the correlation between car ownership and obesity rates in NZ graphed out like this.
Engine capacity does not actually relate to fuel consumption or CO2 emissions. Modern engines do a lot more with a lot less fuel. More importantly modern large engines produce less harmful gas and particle pollutants than older, smaller engined cars. This is something you can measure, and prove, and see the effects compared to arbitrary and political measurements
‘Engine capacity does not actually relate to fuel consumption or CO2 emissions’
Not true. What I think you really meant to say is:
Engine capacity alone does not determine fuel consumption or CO2 emissions; in general newer engines are considerably cleaner and a degree more efficient than older ones, but it is still the case that when comparing two engines of different sizes that are the same age and type the larger one will consume more fuel and create higher emissions, especially when moving a heavier vehicle.
And it is observable that although car engines are getting more efficient but people have been buying bigger cars with bigger engines therefore the efficiency of the nation’s whole fleet has not in fact improved.
This is the point that Matt is making.
Yes, Engine capacity alone does not determine fuel consumption or CO2 emissions
No, larger engines and heavier vehicles do not necessarily create more emissions. Various governments dept’s around the world publish vehicle emission tables for new and old vehicles, you see double digit declines in emissions every ten or so years since the 70’s, and an over general decline since the dawn of ICE’s
e.g. Check http://rightcar.govt.nz/, say Honda Jazz 2008 133 gram/km, 2013 103 gram/km, same engine size. Lexus 4WD 4000cc+ 2007 367 gram/km, 2012 340 gram/km (with 5000cc+ engine!). Suzuki Swift 2000 136 gram/km, 2013 126 gram/km (larger engine)
We also have new technology, like fuel injection, computerised transmission control, hybrid electric motors, variable cylinder control etc. These all reduce fuel use and/or emission’s in modern vehicles.
A 2013 Toyota Corolla (according to carsdirect.com) has exactly the same fuel economy as a 1993 Toyota Corolla.
And my guess is that the 1993 model was 1300cc and the current model is 1800cc. So what is the point?
Actually, no. It was a 1.6l. All I’m saying is that instead of lowering fuel economy, the majority of cars are bigger, have bigger engines and use the same amount of fuel as 20 years ago thus negating the benefits. Much of the weight increase is due to safety requirements of course.
You have to compare apple to apples. What is needed here is a graph of litre of petrol used per Km per year, that would be telling
Emission reduction also means less directly human harmful gases, CO2 does not directly effect us, petrol vapours and large particles do
The average petrol engines car sold in NZ over the past 15 years, as long as it is maintained and has not had any modifications, runs very cleanly. The same can not be said of diesels until very recently.
Emissions from cars have certainly been cleaned up in recent years. To compare the emissions from a new car to that of a new woodheater:
New cars must satisfy strict Euro 5/6 pollution standards, which require a new car, 4WD or SUV travelling 20,000 km a year to emit less than 0.1 kg of PM2.5. In contrast, the New South Wales EPA estimates that a new wood heater will emit 9.8 kg of health-hazardous PM.25 per year. Thus a brand new AS/NZS4013 heater emits as much PM2.5 in 10 hours as a new car does in an entire year.
Vehicle emissions aren’t trivial, because of the number of vehicles on the road, but we definitely have benefited from better regulations.
If you want to clean up Auckland’s air quality, have a guess at where the biggest gains could be made simply and cheaply. Somewhere perhaps where the regulations controlling emissions are piss poor. Why there is such willful blindness to the bleeding obvious frustrates and annoys me.
Pete, re: “You have to compare apple to apples. What is needed here is a graph of litre of petrol used per Km per year, that would be telling” – see http://greaterakl.wpengine.com/2012/12/11/trends-in-car-fuel-efficiency/.
Petrol consumption per kilometre of travel hasn’t budged in the last 12 years in NZ, for which there is reliable data. For the US and Australia, where there are much longer data series, fuel efficiency hasn’t improved in decades.
I remember a SAAB quote from a vehicle launch back in the late 90’s (from memory) saying that in the average city the air coming out of the tail pipe of the new model (9-3?) was cleaner than the air entering the engine prior to combustion.
Another way of looking at it is by considering the Jevon’s effect. The introduction of new efficient technologies to save X (fuel in this case), leads to overall increase in consumption of X (fuel) as people use more of that technology. You may have a more fuel efficient car/fleet, but it won’t matter much because you’ll feel so good about driving something so efficient than before that you drive more, using more fuel.
Unfortunately that logic doesn’t work riding a bike. Bugger.
It isn’t about emissions.
Next time you are out and about, check out how many businesses you go past that are car/combustion egine dependent – auto electricians, panel beaters, car salesyards, mechanics, muffler and brake specialists, tyre shops, spraypainters, care hire firms, petrol stations, tractor and marine engine specialists – the list goes on and on and on.
Something between 25-30% of all economic activity in this country relates to the running of motor vehicles and their engines. Until that changes, I am afraid to say you have to be crazy to propose trying to use draconian tax measures to reduce vehicle emissions, since that would be huge cost imposition on probably the most important sector in our economy in terms of domestic activity and would have a serious impact on the economy.
It is this realisation by politicians of the importance of the motor in our domestic economy that gives the road and trucking lobby such clout. When you think about it, a cycleway doesn’t come festooned with an attendant army of support industries like a motorway does. Any attempt to really, genuinely make us less car dependent has to also come up with a credible plan to replace the lost economic activity, not just a whole of punitive taxes that’ll piss off a pile of voters.
You mean the real economy that motoring enables is all about pissing money up the wall?
Another way to put the exact same comment: Until people start putting some economical pressure on the car and its ecosystem (auto electricians, panel beaters, car salesyards, mechanics, muffler and brake specialists, tyre shops, spraypainters, care hire firms, petrol stations, tractor and marine engine specialists – what you said), there is little chance that any alternatives will be considered. Taxation is the best instrument of political direction, to tend towards the type of society you want, the majority doesn’t like people smoking (because of reasons x, y and associated health costs) so tobacco get taxed heavily. Same principle here.
Pressure is not required on the ecosystem. It is all about vehicle standards and km’s driven. We need to keep up to date with emissions standards (new and used. Why do used, imported cars get to meet a lesser standard then new imported cars?) and safety standards – ESC is mandatory in the EU (and US from memory). The other key is to move to RUC’s for all vehicles. Also, the revenue collected from motor vehicles needs to be viewed as ‘transport’ money, not just for roads. Another item I see missed all the time is that while the road freight industry appears to pay a lot into the motor vehicle account via RUC’s and fuel tax, some 45% (company tax and GST) is in fact claimed back and this is not reported in govt figures for total revenue to the account. If you deducted the claimed tax from this account it would look very different.
“some 45% (company tax and GST) is in fact claimed back”
You are barking up the wrong tree. GST is claimed back but unless the company is deliberately invoicing their customers at less than cost it is paid by their customers (and some). GST is a value added tax.
Similarly with the company tax element. Paying RUCs does not reduce the company’s profit. It applies to all trucking companies and is passed on to their customers (if it is not the trucking company won’t be around for long). Ultimately the government gets the whole lot.
You missed the point. RUC’s have a GST component. Much of this will get claimed back. Likewise with company tax. The average trucking contractor out there (and probably bigger ones as well) will be making sure that they do not make a huge book profit at years end to reduce company tax. The tax component of fuel and RUC’s is a legitimate company expense and so will be used to offset profits made by the company. However, claimed back tax does not show on the overall transport takings as it is IRD related.
Do you understand how a value added tax such as GST works?Trucking companies pass on the expense of RUCs to their customers via their invoices and the GST is added to those invoices. The trucking company reclaims the GST they pay on the RUCs but their customers pay it.
If RUCs go up or down so do trucking rates. It’s a competitive business with little differentiation. Take away the RUcs and trucking rates would fall. There may be hikes in profits for a short while but without collusion to maintain rates (which is illegal) these gains would be short-lived. The idea that trucking companies are acting to minimise profit is just not credible (and the IRD goes to great lengths to make sure that book profit and actual profit are as close as possible).
One way or another the government gets all of the RUCs and all of the GST on them and there is no evidence that the profitability of trucking companies is reduced by an amount commensurate with the RUCs they are paying.
The ‘dependent economy’ argument was also used against the abolition of slavery, and various other ills that some people make a lot of money from.
Well spoken Sanctuary, Matthew, Jacques. Outside the export sector, the roading/car/combustion engine industry and the residential construction industry are perhaps the two most important economic pillars in our community. They are also perhaps the only large-scale job generators outside the services industry (health/IT/education).
Any political party messing with these sectors does need to recognise these factors for any structural policy changes to have any sort of long term economic and political sustainability. In short, new jobs have to be found, ideally generating wealth for our country in the export sector.
Tourism has actually for many years been the largest actual industry in terms of job creation….and of course a big factor in bringing tourists here has been that 100% Pure New Zealand brand…… The downside of tourism jobs is that they generally are low paid, and require us to have a blind spot in terms of the carbon footprint of each tourist traveling here.
So where is another export industry that we can place all those workers currently in the roads industry?
Missed a key word: ‘large-scale domestic job generators’
But this industry isn’t at all productive, it is in fact a huge tax on our productivity. 7-8bil a year lost overseas on oil plus 4-5bil a year on vehicles. ‘important economic pillars’ nonsense. People being busy doesn’t automatically make them productive.
Anyway occupations and ‘industries’ come and go all the time. Blacksmithing was an ‘important economic pillar’ of the 19Cth world: Should we have propped that up too? Want a more recent example: Photolithographers, that job has gone, or rather changed into a new computer based role, same with chemical photo labs…. I know heaps of people from these industries that either had to retrain or move on…. personally traumatic for more than a few who had their whole careers ripped out from under them. Others found a better fresh start. That’s how it goes. There is nothing but change. Anyone who asserts otherwise needs to read a lot more history.
And within the motor industry there has been heaps of change over the years, I can remember when cars came in CKD [Completely Knocked Down], and were assembled here in factories in Thames and Petone, which meant there were baches built out of old ply car cases…. Adaption will happen; we certainly shouldn’t base energy, transport, and environmental policy around the idea of keeping every current job. Which is not to deny the politics of sudden changes and their impacts on the affected people.
Plus the induced poverty which is a consequence of our dependence on motor vehicles – witness households in poor suburbs with no viable PT. Four, five cars in some households, many on hire purchase. The poor Swiss, English, Dutch and Danish don’t suffer this massively impoverishing burden.
Possibly the same place jobs were when the automobile replaced the horse and all the horse transport related jobs disappeared. Or where all the farm jobs went when they were replaced by machinary.
Why does it need to be an export industry? It isnt replacing an export industry, after all. In fact, whatever it is, it will replace one of the biggest imports and largest drains on a positive balance of trade.
If we moved to a more active modes/rail freight/public transport system, off the top of my head, bicycle production and repair, train related services, tram drivers, mechanics, electrical infrastructure workers, IT workers for all the systems to manage PT, loaders for rail, maintennace workers for rail.
NZ has survived transitions before, I am sure we can do it again.
Not disagreeing with either of you, there has to be change. But, you must recognise the wealth generated by this industry. I’m not talking about the country, I’m talking about wages that people take home to feed their family, safe in the knowledge they are in a very secure industry under watchful guardianship by some very powerful movers and shakers. You can bet that this factor will be in the minds of those hoping to lead Labour into power at the next election.
One alternative that I can think of is an upskilled residential construction industry, more capable of delivering a range of housing types, in a timely manner and at a competitive price. This implies greater mass-production and better manufacturing capabilities. Another area with huge potential is export food manufacture. Hopefully Fonterra’s problems this year were just teething troubles, as we move the entire food industry further up the value chain.
Both these suggestions imply a more clustered employment, whether in the main centres or provincial towns…..this will support a change in current sprawl and individual employment trends, and of course the export food manufacture aspect also requires that Pure NZ image.
But the thing is, demanding that certain powerful industry groups downsize without offering an alternative means of employment and (personal) wealth, isn’t going to work.
The closest attempt I have seen on this site trying to link transport changes with wealth generator changes is the link between the CRL and the agglomeration benefits that come with a larger and more vibrant city centre.
I don’t think making our transport investment strategies more rational will be a direct threat to those working in the auto industry at all. No one here is call for any kind of end to driving or cars, driving will still be the dominant movement system in auckland even if we had the CFN tomorrow, much more efficient but still the biggest.
The real threat to this industry is its unsustainability. People increasingly are choosing not to use it, whether because they can’t afford to or because they prefer alternatives or both. I see absolutely no end to this trend, despite the enormous sums being spent to try to keep us driving…. This trend looks structural; it’s being going on too long now [since 04/05] and the discontinuity from previous the pattern is too great.
Ch-ch-changes.
But surely all these industry players who have accumulated their wealth in a capitalist system will be able to dynamically adapt their business to take advantage of new opportunities. Isnt that the line we have been fed for years to justify all the pro-free market reforms that have done far more to increase job insecurity for the average NZ worker? That business people are our saviours and can run the economy much better free of government restrictions and subsidies?
Or do they need government support and subsidies in the form of massive publicly funded motorway projects to make their businesses a success? That doesnt sound like capitalism to me.
“a cycleway doesn’t come festooned with an attendant army of support industries like a motorway does” – No it allows the person to keep their money in their pocket and spend it elsewhere in the economy or maybe even save some money rather than buy more consumer goods to fuel the auto industry. Isn’t that a positive? The Dutch and Danish dont seem miserable or poor – anyway the Dutch own more cars per capita than the British.
As for increasing our wealth through through food production, there isnt any more land made and we are already causing a lot of damage to our waterways, in particular. I mean, dairy farming on the Canterbury plains? How much more can we get away with to increase food production?
Food production? Nope. Food manufacture – its about turning the raw ingredients that we produce into stuff that’s worth more. Whether it is wine, infant formula, boutique cheeses or olive oil, there are things we can do well, at a large scale or as niche products. Without turning the entire country into a dairy farm and destroying our waterways. Quality, not quantity.
Yes, a number of the wealthy “roads inc” players do need government support (and I’m also talking about the USA here), and are very afraid of change. How is it that our motorway construction and materials costs are consistently much higher than overseas examples? This doesn’t bode well for a sustainable future for some of our big construction industry players unless they can develop skills in other areas.
My guess was the 90s before scrolling down to discover it was 1992. An obvious clue was mention of the year 2000, but more the presumption that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide might be a problem, a reasonable hypothesis in the early 90s as George says @12:57. We now know that there is no correlation between carbon dioxide density and atmospheric temperature. Before anyone goes feral, may I suggest you do a simple plot of carbon dioxide levels (ppm) vs global temperatures starting from now and going back as far as you like. Something may be driving the climate, but it sure as heck ain’t CO2. I’m old enough to remember the “next ice-age” predictions of the 70s, followed by the “snow in the UK is now a thing of the past” comments in 2000 (by the CRU). Great fun.
But certainly particulate pollution and road congestion are real issues to be addressed over time, as well as costs of extraction, despite the continually improving efficiencies of the ICE.
On the economic side, the vehicle servicing industry has changed dramatically over my lifetime (OK, that’s a long time) but even more so in recent years where everything is now controlled by chips and very little goes wrong mechanically. In my youth I did valve grinds, crankshaft shell replacements, cylinder rebores and gearbox rebuilds regularly, now I lift the bonnet only to top up the washer fluid. Sad I know.
Before it becomes a huge flame war. Jonno read this: http://www.skepticalscience.com/argument.php
174 arguments against global warming, and why they are not really arguments at all.
That carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, and that increasing its concentration increases the temperature of earth is a well established scientific fact. Denial of physics doesn’t make you clever.
The LA Times no longer hosts letters that deny scientific facts, and in my opinion neither should this site.
Feel free to ban me George (I’m assuming you have that authority), but please just think first about what that implies in terms of both freedom of speech and the scientific method. Your LA Times reference demonstrates both these points: why would a newspaper take such a position? BTW I do know a little bit about physics.
Matthew, I’m well aware of that site. Hint: it’s not a sceptical site despite its name. No. 4 made me laugh though, and you would too (I hope) if you knew how that number was reached.
The thing is, Matt’s post raises some valid points about auto-dependency, so why not focus on that as a social and economic issue?
Free speech doesn’t apply to talking scientific crap.
Actually it does Matthew. That’s the whole point, scientific crap will out itself over time (such as the flat-earth hypothesis of centuries past). What it doesn’t extend to is issues such as defamation.
Talking crap has consequences. When people repeat disproven myths about transport, it has consequences. So too with the climate (except that action now has impacts over thousands of years).
There is a difference. No educated person thought the world was flat from classical times – that is a myth perpetuated by the Flat Earth Society. The Greeks and Romans knew it was a sphere. Any half intelligent person can figure that out by watching a lunar eclipse or a sailing ship sailing over the horizon.
The myth is that Columbus thought the world was round and everyone else it was flat. No, Columbus thought the world was smaller than everyone else did and so he could reach Asia without running out of food and water. He was wrong and they were right, he was just lucky there was a massive continent halfway.
Climate change denial is a whole new level of scientific delusion. The new Flat Earth Society.
Oh dear goosoid, I just posted on another thread how pleased I was that commenters on this blog had stopped using the pejorative term “denier”.
BTW, “scientific delusion” is a contradiction in terms. As a lawyer you would know that, so why use the term? But thanks for explaining the history of flat-earthers; I stand corrected.
I am all for using the words ‘climate change ignoramus’ instead of the word ‘denier’ if you like.
Climate change ignorance is getting more and more untenable. It’s in the laughable category now.
Matthew, I agree with you in respect of climate change ignorance, which unfortunately is an extremely serious matter in terms of global economic damage. Maybe it isn’t ignorance but vested interest, but I hope it’s only ignorance! I’m reluctant to refer to the associated human cost, as that is understandably emotive, but arguably is even more significant.
You appear to be sincere in your beliefs, for which I admire you. I would not presume to attempt to persuade you otherwise, rather to simply suggest that you continue to research the topic with an open mind.
Who says I’ve got a closed mind. I’m not dogmatic, but I have studied a lot about it formally both from Quaternary Earth Science and Climatology perspectives. Now I have little respect for the unthinking regurgitating deniers out there. They are a waste of time and a waste of space. The modern libertarian conservatives are scumbags and deserve zero respect. So there you go, heart on sleeve, if someone thinks the climate system isn’t increasingly dynamic then they’re indistinguishable from an idiot.
“Who says I’ve got a closed mind. I’m not dogmatic, but …“
The Quaternary Period is indeed a fascinating one Matthew. Some postulate that it parallels the emergence of modern man. What is more interesting is that over that period of 2.5m years or so the average global temperature has apparently remained exactly the same (around 14degC). Now I’d be the first to say that averages can be deceptive, as there have been several perturbations, but it’s still an interesting factoid. Kind of puts a few tenths of a degree variation into perspective, doesn’t it?
BTW, I give up, who does say you have a closed mind? I’ll have a quiet word with him or her.
“What is more interesting is that over that period of 2.5m years or so the average global temperature has apparently remained exactly the same (around 14degC” – where the hell did you get that falsoid?
Apologies Matthew, I would have sourced that comment but was under the impression you had studied this era.
Anyway, here’s one source of global temperature variations over the last 500m years – not much change in the last 5m years and previously a lot hotter. It’s a little out of date (stops at 2000AD), so doesn’t show the current flat-lining. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f5/All_palaeotemps.png
I don’t know who compiled this, is it wrong? If so, please point me to the correct data as I’m always keen to increase my knowledge. The 14degC average was from memory; happy to be corrected on that too.
Anyway, the post was about the evolution of the ICE, so perhaps we need to get back on topic!
FFS. Firstly the Quaternary is a period or a system. Era has a distinct meaning. The Quaternary is part of the Cenozoic Era. And you can’t even read a graph. The graph does not support what you said. It supports the opposite of what you said.
PS. There isn’t current flatlining either.
Copy and paste experts, who don’t understand what they post, only look foolish.
Matthew, I have endeavoured to engage with you in a civil manner, but sadly this has become an impossible goal to achieve. I therefore withdraw from the debate.
Good. Your position is untenable, so it will save us both lots of time.
“…Taxation is the best instrument of political direction, to tend towards the type of society you want, the majority doesn’t like people smoking (because of reasons x, y and associated health costs) so tobacco get taxed heavily…”
It should be obvious that smoking is not central to our industrial civilisation in a way liquid fuel engines are.
“…Possibly the same place jobs were when the automobile replaced the horse and all the horse transport related jobs disappeared. Or where all the farm jobs went when they were replaced by machinery….”
The farm workers all went to the city and got jobs in the automobile sector, because that is what replaced horses.
People seem to misunderstand how revolutionary economic change occurs. When horses went west it was because an obviously much better transport option – trains, then the internal combustion engine – came along. The switch over from centuries of use of draft animals was dramatically quick because a liquid fuels engine offers revolutionary advantages over a horse. The whole second industrial revolution basically replaced solid fuel with liquid fuels, and this central efficiency of the engine still underpins life in the age of the digital revolution. At the moment, the internal combustion engine reigns supreme not because of cultural reasons, but because it is by orders of magnitude the most efficient device for doing stuff.
It seems to me revolutionary change occurs because of technological revolution, not because of taxation. Taxing something heavily will not create a revolutionary change in how society is organised if the only point of that taxation is try and artificially cripple the targets technological advantage. Horses did not disappear because they were heavily taxed, they disappeared because engines were a gazillion times better than a horse. I see no equivalent technological driver to job creation that the technologically driven change over from animal to engine produced in an attempt to get rid of motor vehicles by taxation.
the point is there is a big difference between an argument from economic efficiency – that public transport (including cycling) is, for a number of functional and non-functional reasons, a more economically efficient way of moving large numbers of people around an urban landscape – and an ideological desire to create a “type of society you want”. it is a difference PT supporters need to be more mindful of, because while the former has widespread public support the latter is pretty much dismissed by most people as the musing of Greenie loons.
In terms of global warming I would have thought it be obvious by now to any detached observer that the world’s governments have not the slightest intention of doing anything serious about it. After all, there are five billion people on this planet who owe their existence to oil. As George Monboit has said, we’ve certainly got more than enough oil to fry us all. And we will. There are to many people demanding to many resources and everyone wants a westernised, consumer lifestyle. Politicians are not going to commit electoral suicide. The only hope we have is a technological one, where Lockheed and Mitsubishi and BMW can make a fortune building a space umbrella or spraying the upper atmosphere or whatever. The sooner we admit we are to selfish as a species to reduce consumption and get on with geo-engineering solutions, the better. Although every little bit helps, we are not going to save ourselves by riding bikes.
You think that ICEs are the most efficient way to conduct transport in cities? Are you mad?
While I strongly disagree with Sanctuary, petrol _is_ a very efficient fuel.. It’s also practical and cheap. That is why we are struggling so much to create an alternative. Of course, the devil is in the details.
Petrol’s still not as efficient as electricity through overhead lines. As a bonus, electricity can at least potentially come from non-planet-frying sources. But neither is as efficient as simply not having to travel as far in the first place.
It’s ridiculous not to see the political dimension to our oil-heavy economy. It’s not a completely deterministic result of technology – rather, it’s in huge part the result of nearly a century of deliberate governmental planning to promote driving, and driving long distances. Land use and density zoning codes, parking requirements, wholesale clearances of inner-city walkable neighbourhoods, massive spending on roads designed primarily for car traffic, planning all new growth in the form of far flung new suburbs, while trashing the existing ones to make them easier to drive through… this was all done deliberately, first in the thought that cars were the future, and then in the thought that even if cars had negative effects, they were inevitable.
None of these things improved our standard of living in themselves, and they cost us a fortune. A future where we’re less reliant on cars is not an economic disaster, quite the reverse. We go from spending huge amounts of our time and effort supporting pointless travel, and into sectors of the economy (particularly services) that we value more. Economic growth doesn’t have to come from using more resources – it can come from improving the quality of the goods and services we would have had crappier versions of anyway.
+1
Petrol may have quite a high energy density in terms of energy stored in its chemical bonds but put it in the engine of a 1.5 tonne metal box and only 1% of that energy is used in transporting the person driving it. Cars are incredibly wasteful and inefficient.
I would say that you give too much credit to technology and too little to politics. I love tech. I make my living from it. I still don’t want to wait for a tech fix to our energy and transport problems. Who knows, there might not be one.
Politics on the other hand _can_ affect massive societal changes. Slavery, for example, was normal for a loooong time. We had to outlaw it and enforce it strongly for decades until we can now say that it’s pretty much gone from the civilised world.
+1
I thought I would add this here because I know Patrick and others believe we should do away with laws requiring cycle helmets to encourage less car dependency. I know he has been pretty vocal on the subject so I thought I’d post this link and after reading it, he can contact the family direct and inform them of all his reasons. I’m sure they would understand http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lincolnshire-25086451
Proof by emotive anecdote ain’t proof.
And how many people die every year from head trauma in car crashes? By your logic we should all wear helmets in cars. It annoys me that I’m risking a fine when I amble helmetless on Tamaki (bike lane) on a lazy sunny day.
Stop wearing your seat belts Tom, don’t bother replacing your worn brake pads, don’t bother stoping at lights, bad luck and accidents will never happen to you
Feel free to contact the family yourself Mathew. I’m sure they will appreciate your opinions too. Also the NHS doctors and neurosurgeons that support their charity.
You’re using an emotive and sad anecdote to push a political point and you’re completely missing the bigger picture.
Perhaps you can personally contact every kid who has missed out on riding their bike to school because their parents are making poor decisions based on a misunderstanding of the risks because over zealous safety campaigners who themselves have a poor understanding of the risk keep pushing their barrows.
In other words don’t be a dick.
That would be fairly heartless and cruel dont you think? I am surprised you would suggest such a terrible thing.
Compulsory cycle helmet laws have certainly stopped people suffering brain damage in crashes. But not by protecting the brain in high speed collisions (something they are not designed to do) but by consistently lowering the number of people cycling in NZ/AU since 1993. Of course, less cyclists also makes the cycling environment more dangerous and therefore creates more crashes.
Maybe you all will have a change of heart if such an accident happens to yourselves or someone you care about. It is no hardship to wear a helmet unless you think your hair is more important than your brain. Helmets should be sold as a compulsory purchase with every bike and fines for not wearing them should be steep.
I think safety jerks should be fined. Especially ones who misunderstand the risks and compel others to do as their little scaredy-cat brains think.
Real bike safety is under the wheel in well designed infrastucture which puts motorised vehicles in their place and your misguided safety message is blurring the real message of what is needed. You are a shrill supporter of motoring, rather than a friend of cyclists. Helmets on cyclists is because of the relative political power of motorists. If it was really about safety then motorists would wear helmets and never travel at more than 30km/hr.
Sorry everyone for indulging the off topic troll.
If that happened I would be campaigning even harder for slower vehicle speeds, narrower roads and separated cycle facilities. The things that really make cycling safer.
For disambiguation: My view is that legislating mandatory Cycle helmets and/ or hivis clothing but not safe streets for all users is all backwards and is akin to making all women wear burkas because some men can’t be trusted to control themselves if they see a normally dressed woman. In both cases this understands a problem as if its only cause is the victims’. And in both cases it represents the view of the powerful, not an objective view.
In other words it acts as if the entire cause of all cycling injury is because of insufficient armour not because our street and road design allows, enables, far too many and too serious accidents, especially those involving asymmetrical powered vehicle on cyclists collisions.
Of course crash survival equipment for all people at all times in all vehicles and situations would help limit injury and tragedy but this is surely of a second order compared to decisions that consistently prevent such events happening at all.
Also individual examples can be found to support any position and do not make for a strong argument. Especially where inflamed with manipulative emotional content. Poor work.
I have re posted your comments on the victims charity site Mathew, let’s see how many of the boys friends and family share your thoughts.
Go away Phil
You owe me an apology for that.
Site moderators – can you ban this prick please?
Unfortunately the blog’s greatest fans seem to be the worst trolls. They use fake user names and email addresses, random IP’s etc to keep coming back. Without being extremely draconian on everyone there is no way to exclude a committed troll indefinitely.
It’s a bit extreme, but hire the services of a hit man?
What Phil? And miss the hilarity of the little man’s insecurities being laid out for to see, no way. And on that topic we haven’t heard nearly enough about your powerful and expensive car here lately, Phil, how is that compensation for your inadequacies going? Not too well clearly given you have to skulk round pretending to be anyone else trying to upset people you don’t even know….
Sadly the helmet advocates are missing the big picture, i.e. the unintended consequence that more restrictive safety requirements for cyclists have led to greatly reduced cycling, and therefore a vastly more dangerous environment for the few who do venture out.
Take a look at a typical street scene from 1940s or 1950s Christchurch and you will see that every road is a huge cycleway, with a handful of cars gingerly proceeding through the mass of bikes.
The same scene today would be totally dominated by cars and an utterly hazardous environment for cyclists.
That cause and effect isn’t established. The causality of the correlation could equally run the other way (helmets laws were introduced in response to falling cycle + increasing traffic rates and corresponding worsening of safety environment), or indeed they could be unrelated. For example falling cycle rates were cause by something else (say increased motorisation and dispersal of housing), and the introduction of helmet laws were neither caused by or affected that trend.
There is clear evidence that the decline in cycling started before helmet laws were introduced. Now that alone doesn’t prove causality one way or another, but it does indicate that at least some of the decline was due to other factors.
Yes but as I have pointed out before, if the evidence is so overwhelming then you have to ask why no other country than NZ/AU has put in place such a law. Also why so many countries (Ireland, N Ireland, Spain, UK) have recently rejected the idea (and Israel scrapped a universal helmet law) because they dont want to reduce the number of cyclists.
So all the rest of the world is wronga nd Australasia is right. Wow, we are smart!
I think the main benefit of my bike helmet is that my bald spot doesn’t get sunburnt.
I didn’t mention any evidence for or against helmet laws Goose, just that it is undeniable that cycling had already started to decline across the 1980s well before helmet laws were introduced in 1994. That is the evidence I was referring to. Whether the laws are effective or not is beside the point that helmets can’t be the sole factor in reduced cycling rates, as Linz appears to be assuming with the comment “i.e. the unintended consequence that more restrictive safety requirements for cyclists have led to greatly reduced cycling”.
Saying that cycling was already in decline doesn’t assume any influence or not of helmet laws, it just shows that cycling was already in decline. Looking at photos of all the cycling in Christchurch in the 50s as evidence that helmet laws introduced in 1994 caused it all to dissappear is one hell of a stretch. Perhaps more enlightening is the comment “the same scene today would be totally dominated by cars and an utterly hazardous environment for cyclists”. A more parsimonious hypothesis would be that the introduction of masses of cars between the 50s and today is what made the road hazardous for cyclists and drove down cycling numbers. But maybe it was just the helmet laws.
I’m not confident to attribute causality either way based on the available data (personally I don’t think there is either an effect of helmet laws on cycle rates, or of cycle rates on helmet laws. I think the two are independent as per my second point, but couldn’t confirm that. My guess is we’d have exactly the same cycling rates if we had never implemented helmet laws).
The law may have been introduced in 1994 but from 1988 or so there was a concerted effort in schools and the media to push for helmets and ‘explain’ the dangers of riding a bike. What they all forgot was that Aaron Oaten was hit by a car before he came off his bike. We’ve done virtually nothing in the 30 years since his crash to fix that.
Yesp, judging by the cycling rates in the UK, USA and other developed countries with no helmet laws and no good quality cycling infrastructure, you are probably right on that – sadly.
Although the USA has no federal helmet laws many of the states do. Often they only relate to on-road cyclists. I suspect many other countries round the world would be similar. There is also the question of enforcement as well were often a law can exist yet never be enforced and so nobody knows.
Id say cycle helmets should only be required if your cycling on the road. If your on the footpath or off line cycle way and doing under 10km/h (running speed) you should be free to go without a helmet.
I agree. And with the snowy one! The planets must be in some strange alignment today….
That is already the case, helmet laws only apply when riding on the road in New Zealand, although in most circumstances riding on the footpath is illegal anyway.
It’s literally true that the helmet law refers to cycling on the “road”, but through a tortured definition that actually covers a vast array of places (“[any] place to which the public have access, whether as of right or not”). NZTA have a marginally helpful factsheet about what counts as a “road”.
That definitely includes footpaths, shared paths, shared spaces, completely separated cycle paths like the Northwestern, and even places like supermarket carparks.
On the other hand, only “bicycles” require helmets, so as long as it doesn’t have exactly two wheels, you’re away laughing.
Heck, you are even required to wear helmets when cycling on dead-flat rail trails in Central Otago…
Oh, and to repeat my estimate from Twitter: New Zealanders ride around 2,500 unhelmeted km for every ticket that’s actually given out. I don’t have any more detailed stats on the circumstances under which people were ticketed, but I’d suspect that you’re far more likely to get a ticket if you’re doing something else illegal, dangerous or policeman-annoying at the same time, so realistically you can ride helmetless pretty much with impunity (if that’s all you do).
If you approximate your bike’s running costs as zero, you can do the same with the chance of getting a helmet ticket. I use a helmet on busy roads – when I think there’s a realistic chance I’ll get knocked off and it might actually matter – but otherwise I join the 8% and don’t bother.
Even if your luck is exactly average on the Otago Rail Trail in the middle of nowhere, you’d still expect to ride it end-to-end 16 times before getting a ticket.